9.1 Proposal: Printing support

[Bill Bogstad]

On Tue, Oct 21, 2008 at 4:31 PM, Aaron Konstam <akonstam at sbcglobal.net> wrote:

> Only in the sense that when the application runs that wants to print you
> need to tell it which printer it is to use.However, if there is only one
> printer and that is made the default,even that does not have to be done.

Unfortunately there is one thing which probably does need to be
specified by the user (or at least configurable in the XS image).
For what size PAPER is this document being formatted?  Whether PDF or
Postscript is the lingua franca this is still an issue.  Oh, and I
think
a lingua franca is very important.

BTW, I think there are actually three parts to the problem:

1. What happens in the Activity/XO? (what output (Postscript/PDF, page
size) format and where the output is sent)
2. How the output is transported to the 'other system'?
                Print to Journal (file) - this lets people cobble
together local solutions - should (IMHO) be part of version 0 of any
solution
                IPP
                LPR
                Direct USB connection - pulls all of #3 onto the XO -
not recommended by me
3. Formatting for actual printer and getting it there - queue and
resource managment/printer drivers

#1 and #2 directly involve the XO.  #3 can involve an XS, but
shouldn't require one.

On the choice of a lingua franca, I would vote for PDF.  Few printers
speak it directly, but just about all other computer systems
have some way to view (and usually print it).  Internet Cafes and USB
memory sticks could be a reasonable print solution for many.

Bill Bogstad